Sustainability Agreements and Article 101 TFEUE

The original notion of individual consumer’s benefit triggering the derogatory effects under Art. 101.3 TFEU has been superseded and definitively expanded so as to include not only individual consumers’ benefits but also all other social value benefits fostering the development of a new social model of market economy superseding the old one embodied in the original Treaty of Rome. On this basis, the paper discusses the recent Communication whereby the EU Commission has provided instructions and guidelines for the proper assessment of the compatibility of horizontal cooperation agreements with the objective set out by Art. 3 TEU of contributing to the shaping of a new European social market economy. This, in particular, implies the extension of the scope of action of all competent public authorities and the evolution of their power of control to such an extent as to include the assessment of the consistency and the actual sustainability of the effects deriving from each specific cooperation agreement for the benefit of the entire community thereby affected.